Perry urges guest worker program in immigration reform plan

Published: Thursday, December 07, 2006

KELLEY SHANNONASSOCIATED PRESS

AUSTIN - Emphasizing immigration reform far more than he did before his re-election, Republican Gov. Rick Perry said Wednesday that a guest worker program is needed for Mexican immigrants employed in the United States.

Federal authorities should work toward providing identification cards for immigrant workers that allow them to freely cross the border, Perry said. Such a program should emphasize the "rule of law" and not reward those who break the law, he said.

"I'd a whole lot rather know who it is that crosses our border legally to work than not know who it is that crosses our border illegally to work," Perry said.

The governor also said he disagrees with new state legislation proposed by a fellow Republican, Rep. Leo Berman of Tyler, designed to challenge the automatic citizenship of babies born in the United States to illegal immigrants.

"I think any of those types of legislation that create divisions are bad. We need to look at ways to be bringing people together rather than driving wedges between them," Perry said.

Berman's proposal would bar the babies of undocumented immigrants from receiving state benefits such as food stamps, health care or public housing. He has said he hopes any legal challenge to his bill, if it's enacted, would reach the U.S. Supreme Court so that the justices would address the issue of citizenship.

Perry's comments were much more conciliatory and tilted toward immigration reform than were his speeches before his Nov. 7 re-election. In the campaign, as he worked to drum up conservative support in all regions of Texas, he mostly steered away from discussing immigration proposals and instead stressed the need to crack down on border crime.

He said at the time that immigration changes could only be debated after border security is accomplished. Perry did say during the campaign that he supported some type of guest worker program.

He went a step further and offered more opinions Wednesday in an Austin speech to the Texas Border Coalition, made up of mayors and other public officials along the Texas-Mexico border. He said the sides are linked by common economies and cultures.

"Our economy is greatly impacted by migrant workers. Let's create a guest worker program that takes these workers off the black market and that legitimizes their economic contributions without doing the same for their citizenship," Perry said, to applause from coalition members.

Immigrants who are already in the country illegally should be given "an expanded period of time in which to come to register" for a guest worker program, he told news reporters later.

Some Texas business leaders have said they want a federal immigration plan that will provide for the immigrant labor market their companies need. A broad immigration bill approved by the U.S. Senate and backed by President Bush called for a guest worker program that would issue ID cards. But no immigration compromise has been reached between the two chambers of Congress.

Perry has said he disagrees with those who have called for a wall or fence along the entire border, and he made that point again Wednesday. He said some "strategic fencing" in urban areas along the border makes sense.

"Building a wall across the entire border is a preposterous idea," he added. "The only thing a wall would possibly accomplish is to really help the ladder business or the tunneling business."

Perry again said the federal government has been slow to act when it comes to the border.